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My guest today is Jerome Osentowski, founder of Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture Institute, a long time permaculture practitioners and teacher, and author of the new book The Forest Garden Greenhouse, available from Chelsea Green Publishing.

During the conversation today, we talk about his many years building and consulting on the construction of greenhouses. At his site in Basalt, Colorado, this includes creating local greenhouse environments that allows the growing of citrus, and to hold temperatures at a minimum temperature of 55 degrees year round. As a permaculture practitioner this stems from multiple systems, but one active method that Jerome has developed is his climate battery, the principles and functions of which he shares with us, and further details of which are in his book. Whether you have an interest in gardening, greenhouses, or appropriate technology, you’ll enjoy hearing Jerome share his experiences and knowledge.

You can find out more about him, his work, and book at the Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture website, CRMPI.org.

As I mentioned during this conversation, I owe a lot of my permaculture education to what Jerome and the team at CRMPI have done over the years because that is where, as I remember, Ben Weiss trained before teaching me. If you are looking for a Permaculture Design Course or to study professional practices, you’d be hard pressed not to study there if you can make it. As part of the work for this show, as I said to Jerome, I’m interested in visiting sometime to learn more, we’ll see what happens with that.

For anyone interested in starting a small business, whether permaculture or otherwise, there is something to be said for the ongoing adaption and stick-to-it-iveness that Jerome and CRMPI have gone through over the years to keep operating. Rebuilding the greenhouse after losing it in the fire. Operating multiple businesses to provide financial income and redundancy. Trying different things to see what works. What fits for that environment, physically, socially, and metaphorically.

I also like that he is planning for the succession of CRMPI and the other businesses, so that this work can go on. Not just for another season, or another month, but for decades to come. A reminder to think long term, beyond our own lives and to flourishing future generations.

If there is any way I can help you to explore the possibilities of your local community, to prepare for a bountiful future, or to grow your business or permaculture practice, get in touch.

Give me a call: .

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The Permaculture Podcast

The Permaculture Podcast

In the show notes of this episode there are several announcements I want to share with you. The first, is the upcoming Free the Seeds! seed swap and start fair on March 19, 2016 at the Flathead Valley Community College in Kalispell, Montana. The event includes workshops on starting seeds, savings seeds, bee keeping, food preserving, and, of course, permaculture. You’ll find a high-resolution copy of the the flyer in the show notes, and you can also check out the website at freetheseedsmt.com.

The second is Wild Cooperative, which is a budding community started by a couple on 16 acres in Crawford, Colorado. They are looking for folks interested in building a permaculture based bio-centric community. Read more about this There you’ll also find satellite and other pictures detailing the location and layout of the land. Read more about this project:

https://wildcooperative.wordpress.com/2016/02/15/in-search-of-community/

From here, on February 22, I’ll be in Baltimore for an open house and round table recording with Charm City Farms. Find more information at:

Johnston Square Open House

On June 18, 2016, is the Mid-Atlantic Permaculture Convergence at The Riverside Project in Charles Town, West Virginia. Michael Judd is the keynote speaker. I’m hosting an in-person round table recording. Workshops include Living in the Gift with Seppi Garrett from Seppi’s Place, Children and Permaculture with Jen Mendez of PermieKids, and Broad Acre Agriculture for Permaculture Practitioners with Ethan Strickler.

Tickets are currently on-sale and early bird pricing ends on Sunday, February 14, 2016, so pick up your ticket today.

Mid-Atlantic Permaculture Convergence Tickets

As we draw this episode to a close, the next interview is David Peter Stroh, joining me to talk about Personal Transformation and Systems Thinking for Social Change, and after that is Nati Passow of Jewish Farm School, for our first conversation on Judaism and Earth Care.

Until the next time, take care of Earth, your self, and each other.

Resources:

The Forest Garden Greenhouse

Free The Seeds

Johnston Square Open House

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[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="432"] Byron Joel[/caption]

Find out out more about him and his work at oaktreedesigns.com.au, which is where you will also find a digital copy of A Lesson in Identity and can read the text for yourself.

Resources:

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My guest today is Rachel Kaplan a member of 13 Moon Collaborative and co-author of an excellent book on practicing permaculture in cities and suburbs, Urban Homesteading. This conversation centers around her work with the collaborative and how to foster permaculture people, not just permaculture landscapes. This is more than permaculture as a design practice, but as an embodiment of all the pieces that make permaculture what it has become, a way to live in an ecologically sound way.

If you would like to join the next session of the Permaculture from the Inside Out Design Course, classes start March 19, 2016, and you can find more information at https://13MoonCollaborative.com

Stepping away from this interview, I find my view on the idea of Zone 00 changing. For a long time I rejected the idea of the personal work, of the inner landscape, because it skirted the line of spirituality and woo a bit too much for my taste, because the presentations of the idea of Zone 00 were couched in language more mystical than mundane. Studying the American Civil Rights Movement and other non-violent movements, however, showed that transformation begins with the self before the physical manifestation in the world. In some cases, like the Salt March lead by Ghandi, can take 15 years of personal growth and preparation. Those stories are too often left out of the history books and so we only see the end results. Not the beginning.

For us to create a more bountiful world we need to address that inner landscape to know our heart’s desire, understand our calling, and to heal so that we can heal the world. By taking care of ourselves, we can practice permaculture from the inside out.

Wherever you are on your journey, whatever you are doing whether you are a new student, a teacher, or a small business owner, the door remains open if there is some way I can assist you.  Give me a call: . Send me an email:

You can also drop something in the post:

The Permaculture Podcast

The Permaculture Podcast

From here the next episode is a permabyte featuring Byron Joel sharing a piece he wrote entitled, “A Lesson in Identity.” After that is Jerome Osentowski, author of “The Forest Garden Greenhouse.”

A quick update from behind the scenes.

On February 22, I’ll be in Baltimore for an open house and round table recording with Charm City Farms. Find more information by following the link in the show notes.

Johnston Square Open House

June 18, 2016, is the Mid-Atlantic Permaculture Convergence at The Riverside Project in Charles Town, West Virginia. Michael Judd is the keynote speaker. I’m hosting an in-person round table recording. Workshops include Fermentation and Food Preservation with Diane Blust of Chicory Hill Farm; Animals in Permaculture with Nicole Luttrell of Wild Song Farm; Tree Identification walks with Shawn Walker of Trees101; and Living in the Gift with Seppi Garrett.

Tickets are currently on-sale and early bird pricing ends on Sunday, February 14, 2016, so pick up your ticket today.

Mid-Atlantic Permaculture Convergence Tickets

Also we are looking for presenters for future events. If you’d like to be added to the presenter list contact me with your information and details of your work.

As this episode comes out everyone at Seppi’s Place is falling into what life is like when the people you share space with are not roommates, but  members of your community. In our case this means a more egalitarian approach to living. We share food, drink, and other items in the common area. I am now the self-designated snack-master, picking up the handful of things, like chips and icecream, that we all enjoy, but do not as of yet make onsite.

With the dissolution of my marriage and this move, I’m happy to say that my children have also come and spent time here, ready to return at a moment’s notice. Their mother, my unwife, has had dinner here and shared the space at Seppi’s Place with our children and my roommates. I continue to spend time at her house with them, and remain an integral part of our family.

If you are interested and want to know more about this process of unmarrying, as opposed to divorce, let me know and I can put together an episode to talk about the process of how my former spouse and I ended our marriage in order to save our family.

As I say my door is always open and that includes being here to help beyond the umbrella of permaculture. Let me know if I can help you.

In any way.

Until the next time spend each day creating the world you want to live in by taking care of Earth, yourself, and each other.

Resources:

13 Moon Collaborative (Rachel’s Teaching Work)

Charles Eisenstein

Johnston Square Open House

Online: via PayPal

Venmo: @permaculturepodcast

Enjoy this episode? Become a Patron.

This episode is an interview with Taj Scicluna, the Perma Pixie, about her development of a permaculture business, and the work required to be a small business owner. Along the way we also talk about education, and some of the differences between Australian and American training, including the work to formalize the permaculture design certificate. You can find out more about Taj and her work at ThePermaPixie.com, which includes her calendar, blog, videos, and lots of other information.

What I like about this conversation is hearing that there is a movement afoot in the world to take this work of permaculture and find ways to make it more available and accessible through existing systems. To professionalize our practices. To provide opportunities that help fund education and make permaculture more accessible through programs that already exist.

Another piece of this is Taj’s sharing of a potential 4th ethic, the ethic of transition. I like this idea, and am considering including it in my own practices, as it continues the thread discussing the space between personal responsibility and the systemic issues we face within the culture we come from that extends directly into the practice of permaculture. Though we might encapsulate this in the existing strategy of appropriate technology, I find that this stands stronger as an ethic, because it provides a place to work through the world we live in at the moment, so we can build the framework of the world we want to live in.

In that, each of us have choices to make. What will we use from the old system to build the new? For some that includes formal education in the university model as it stands. To others that means accepting an informal process that provides different opportunities. In permaculture, that could be embracing the Mollisonian approach to a Permaculture Design Course, underneath the umbrella of a group like PRI or PINA, while others are creating new programs that deliver the similar content in a different way that includes things like new Ethics or principles that build on the earlier material, or focused on a particular subset of the community such as activists or community organizers. Others still might live in the gift while others use capitalism. While one rejects flying another might use flight as a way to teach the world. Live without computers or electricity as a model for others, or embrace these technologies to share those ideas with the world.

In making these choices, deciding how to move forward as individuals, we need to start talking about what we are doing as a community, inside and outside of permaculture. What works? What doesn’t? Where do we feel included? Where do we feel excluded? How are we our own worst enemies? Is organizing formally drawing you in to do more? Or are you feeling rejected because of the emerging structures? Where do you see examples of racism? Sexism? Where can we be allies to one another and come together to make a real and lasting difference?

You are not alone. I am not alone. We’re all in this together. Let’s work on making the world a more bountiful place.

If there is anyway I can help, get in touch.

Email: The Permaculture Podcast

Or, if you want, send me a letter.

The Permaculture Podcast

From here the next interview is with Rachel Kaplan of the 13 Moon Collaborative, and after that Jerome Osentowski from Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture joins me to talk about his book The Forest Garden Greenhouse.

Now a quick update behind the scenes of the show. I’m back from The Possibility Alliance and it was an incredible time. Ethan and I recorded over 14 hours of raw audio,  10 hours of video, and I took nearly 1,000 photographs, many of various documents detailing the various ideas at the PA, and dozens of pages of notes. The editing, sorting, and sifting have begun to bring the book into reality, and I’m leaving early access to the book and the ability for listeners to pledge to the project open. Find out more at:

The Possibility Handbook

I am also now setup and operating from Seppi’s place and am integrating into this space. Alongside Seppi, our collective four children, and our other housemate Eric, we are learning what it means to live in community, not just as roommates or people who share space. Already, in less than a week, rituals, roles, and schedules are emerging that mutually support one another. It’s interesting to live with, for, and alongside other people, as opposed to just sharing space. Like tonight, as this episode goes out, I’m making a pasta dinner for everyone in our community, along with my unwife joining us as well.

Moving forward with producing the podcast, working on the book, and living with Seppi and the other cast of characters, I’ll continue to add updates and experiences like this to the show. You can always find the latest and greatest in each new episode.

Which will finally bring this episode to a close. All my best to you. Until the next time, spend each day creating the world you want to live in by taking care of Earth, yourself, and each other.

Resources: